A pillow sham is an ornamental covering for a pillow and a traditional bedding accessory. The design of a typical pillow sham is shown in FIG. 1. The sham 10 may be made from a single sheet 15 of material such as cotton, a blended cotton/synthetic material, or other types of traditional textile materials. The sheet 15 is generally hemmed along its lateral edges 20 and then folded twice to create a front side 25 with two (2) overlapping back panels 30 and 35. The transverse edges 40 of the sheet 15 are then sewn together. A manufacturer's label 50 may be sewn into one of the lateral edges 20. The sham 10 is then turned rightside out (the sham 10 is generally made inside out), packaged, and shipped. In use, the user places a pillow (not shown), in an opening 60 created between the overlapping panels 30, 35.
Traditionally, pillow shams 10 have been hemmed, folded, and sewn by hand in the process described above. Such a process, however, is labor intensive. The production volume in the manual process is relatively low. Further, high quality was not always achieved in the manual process because a pillow sham demands uniform hems and folds.
What is needed, therefore, is a method and an apparatus for manufacturing pillow shams. The method and the apparatus must be accurate so as to create a high quality pillow sham in a high speed manner.